


Maybe

by AustinB



Series: Tumblr Prompts [15]
Category: Daredevil (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Everything is the same except Matt and Karen meet in middle school, F/M, First Kiss, Friends to Lovers, From Karen, Matt Murdock Needs a Hug, Mutual Pining, and are immediate besties
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-01-19
Updated: 2016-01-22
Packaged: 2018-05-14 22:21:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,772
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5761066
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AustinB/pseuds/AustinB
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The wonderful, terrifying maybe that has lived between them for the last five years is suddenly a lot bigger and a helluva lot more terrifying.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Truly Madly Deeply

**Author's Note:**

> For the High School AU and slow-dancing prompts!

He can tell when she walks in that she’s new. He’d been training with Stick for months, and practiced by identifying his classmates through the cadence of their steps, heartbeats and breathing. He hasn’t heard these footfalls before, and her heartbeat and breath is accelerated, nervous.

She moves to the back of the class, and since he’s sitting in the very back corner, she takes the empty seat just in front of him. She fidgets with her hair, brushing it back off her shoulder, where some of it pools on his desk.

The teacher introduces her at the beginning of the class, and he can feel her cheeks heat. When the bell rings, she waits until everyone is gone before standing. He always does the same, to avoid being jostled by eager students, and since no one in the class stayed behind to introduce themselves, he does.

“Hi, I’m Matt,” he says, and she whips around as if she had no idea he was there. 

“Oh, hi. I’m Karen,” she replies softly.

“I know.”

“Right,” she chuckles nervously, tucking her hair behind her ears. Matt doesn’t often wish he could see people again– he saves that toxic longing for things like the sky –but he wishes he could see what color that hair is.

“Come on, I’ll show you to your next class. I can’t see anymore, but I remember where everything is,” he jokes, and it startles her.

“Oh, so you used to…” she trails off as they walk side by side down the hall, and get to know each other. He’d thought her shy at first, but she’s effusive once he’s broken the ice, and it’s nice. So nice that they have lunch together and walk to classes together. Not that his friends abandoned him when he lost his sight–quite the opposite–but he feels disconnected from them. The kid he was before is gone. They don’t really know him anymore. 

* * *

_Three Years Later_

He closes the textbook with a sigh and sets his head on it. There will be no homework done tonight, his mind too distracted by how close Bobby Himes and Karen must be dancing by now. The overzealous tool had asked Karen to prom weeks ago, before Matt could even wonder if he should instead. He could be there right now, too, if he’d accepted Sarah’s invitation, but he’d lost his enthusiasm for the school tradition.

He hears a soft crunch on the leaves outside, then the _tink_ of a pebble hitting his window. He rolls off his bed and shoves the window open.

“Are you ok?” he whispers down to Karen.

“Yeah, just let me in,” she whispers back through a giggle.

Matt slips downstairs to retrieve Karen from the front porch and they quietly go back upstairs. Once his door is shut, he turns to her.

“Why didn’t you just knock on the door? Wait–no, actually back up. Why are you here?”

“First of all, I didn’t want the Feldmans to see me. Secondly, the dance was lame so I figured if I was going to be bored I might as well do it here,” she said casually, sitting on the bench under his window and leafing through one of his Braille books.

He doesn’t buy it for a second. She’d been gushing about the dress, the hair and the dance for weeks.

“What really happened?” he asks, sitting on his bed. Karen huffs and shifts, but eventually answers.

“Himes is a tool.”

“I could’ve told you that.”

“You _did_ tell me that.”

“Oh yeah, I did,” he says innocently, and almost catches the book she throws at him, but bats it away instead. “Hey! Don’t throw things at the blind kid!”

She won’t tell him what exactly happened, but she’s here and is in fine spirits, so Matt lets it be. He’ll trip Bobby Himes in the hallway with his cane the first chance he gets, though.

“Come on,” Matt says after they’ve sat and talked for a while. He stands in front of her and holds out a hand. She takes it. “It’s prom, and you’re not dancing.” He tugs her up.

“What?” she chuckles as he steps closer to her. “But there’s no music.”

Matt pulls her arms around his neck and loops his around her waist. They’ve been friends for ages, this is hardly the first time they’ve been this close, but her arms and shoulders are bare and her dress is crushed velvet under his fingertips.

“So sing,” he suggests. He could very easily flip on his radio, but he likes the sound of her voice. 

She shifts her weight to step away, but Matt steps with her, as though they were dancing already. She heaves a put-upon sigh and loops her arms back around his neck, pressing in so her lips are just barely brushing his jaw, and then she starts to sing. They sway and spin in his room, Karen’s soft melody guiding them.

Matt has the sinking feeling that he’s done for. He wants to pull her body flush against his, wants to move his hands over her skin. Wants, wants, wants.

When she finishes the song, Matt dips his head closer to her ear.

“Another.” 

Her shuddering breath sends a jolt of pleasure through him and he entertains the idea that if he pulled her body flush against his, if he moved his hands over her skin, maybe she wouldn’t punch him.

But despite being able to hold his own against men twice his size and hear conversations three rooms over, the petite package of sunshine in his arms terrifies him.

So he’ll just hold his tongue and ignore the wild hammering of her heart that matches his own.


	2. Maybe

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Does Karen know?” he growls, the taste of salt water thick in the air.
> 
> Matt shakes his head, his heart squeezing at just the thought of it. “She can’t. Not ever, Foggy. Please.”
> 
> She’d hate him. He’s kept this secret from her his entire life, for their entire friendship. Matt’s barely holding on as it is, but if he didn’t have her–

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> no one asked for this, i'm just garbage. please, come into my dumpster, have a seat, enjoy your stay.

She gets a little funny when Foggy starts coming around. 

She’s chosen to go to a university closer to home for her business degree, while he’s gone several hours away. They email constantly, and talk on the phone every couple days, but he misses her all the same. She inquires after “that Froggy dude” with resentment in her voice and he’s selfishly gratified that it’s not just him.

She comes to visit him for a few days when her school breaks before his. 

Matt bounces on the balls of his feet at the bus stop, while Foggy keeps up a stream of chatter beside him. 

“Matt!” she squeals when she steps onto the sidewalk, and he braces himself for her crushing hug. She smells just the same, he’s not sure why that’s a surprise, but it’s also an overwhelming relief.

“So this is the mythical Karen Page?” Foggy says. “Honestly I thought Matt was making you up.”

Karen tips her head to him, smiling. “You must be Froggy.”

Foggy guffaws, “It’s Franklin, to you.”

They get along, and it’s kind of a nightmare. They get along so well Matt sometimes sits idle in the conversation at the diner they go to for lunch, listening to them banter playfully. Karen smacks Foggy’s arm and he pretends to be wounded. It’s so similar to a hundred moments from the last ten years of their friendship that he almost can’t breathe.

She seems different somehow, as if a few months apart have allowed her to grow away from him. She has her own stories and experiences. Matt wonders if it’s too late to transfer.

“Hey, man,” Foggy says to him when Karen’s out of earshot, and Matt’s hackles go up instantly. “Were you gonna ask her out?”

“What? No! We’re just friends, why?” he asks, probably a little too sharply. Foggy doesn’t notice.

“Well if you don’t think it’d be weird, I might ask her out.”

Even though Matt’s entire body is fighting the words, he manages to say, “You should totally ask her out.”

The thing is, they’d be _great_ together. Foggy could _deserve_ her, in a way Matt’s darkness would never allow.

* * *

College is great, it’s the first step toward a new, better life, for both of them. But he just misses her so damn much when she’s not around. The way she laughs, the way she touches him, casual and warm. The way she _knows_ him–mostly–and can take one look at him and say what he’s thinking.

He loves Foggy, but it’s not the same. For the majority of his life, he hadn’t had any family. He’d had Karen.

An older classmate buys them beer, and they spend an evening playing cards in Matt and Foggy’s dorm room. They push the two single beds together and pull the desk up to the foot of them, so they can play a movie on Matt’s desktop computer. Karen gets loopy and giggly after two drinks, and launches herself into the center between the two men.

An hour later, Foggy is slouched down and halfway off one bed, and Karen wiggles closer to Matt.

“I’m sinking into the crack,” she whispers, which sets them off into muffled drunken laughter.

Matt’s starting to drift away into sleep when she turns toward him, slinging an arm over his shoulders, and her lips bump against his jaw. It’s an accident, but once it’s done, the thought is planted. Karen angles her lips and presses them to his, her hand sliding up his arm to his face. She drags her thumb along his pulse point and parts her lips to kiss him again. 

He’s trying to be passive, because she’s half drunk and half asleep, but so is he, so he makes no move to actually stop her. Then her tongue traces along his lower lip and his tenuous control snaps; he opens his mouth against hers. She lets him kiss her, too hard and too hungry, for a brief moment before pushing away and rolling onto her back with a sleepy chuckle. She throws one arm over her eyes and falls asleep.

Half hard and more than a little panicked, Matt tries to control his harsh breathing so he won’t wake either of his friends up. 

The wonderful, terrifying _**maybe**_ that has lived between them for the last five years is suddenly a lot bigger and a helluva lot more terrifying.

* * *

They go out for dinner and dancing for her last night with them. She’s a good dancer–Matt would know, but she doesn’t manage to get him out onto the floor. Foggy comes back to where Matt’s parked at the bar, breathless and giddy.

“She went to the bathroom,” Foggy informs him, without him even having to ask.

“I thought you were going to ask her out.” Matt’s been waiting for Karen to come asking for his blessing, his shoulders and jaw tense all weekend, like waiting for a punch. 

Foggy shrugs, “I changed my mind.”

Matt leans back, as if Foggy’d just spit in his face. “You– changed your mind?” How could a person who claims to be smart enough to be a lawyer change their mind about wanting _Karen fucking Page?_

He’s a little offended on her behalf, but mostly pissed at Foggy, because he’d really thought his friend had good judgement, but maybe not.

Foggy is silent and Matt thinks over that last sentence. He blushes and looks away. Foggy lets the conversation drop, and Matt knows he’s been found out.

* * *

Karen comes to visit a couple times each year, and Matt visits her once or twice at her school. She and Foggy become good friends, but Matt appeases his jealousy by rationalizing that they’re better friends. They’re _best_ friends.

They graduate, start their own firm and Karen comes to work for them like they’d always talked about. The three of them, their own family.

To have her there every day is a cool balm on stinging wounds. Sometimes quite literally. 

He’s selfish, when it comes to her. He wants more. He knows he can’t have it and that’s ok. Just this will have to be enough. She’s too close as it is, it’s too dangerous. He comes to understand that all the better when Foggy finds out about Daredevil.

“Does Karen know?” he growls, the taste of salt water thick in the air.

Matt shakes his head, his heart squeezing at just the thought of it. “She can’t. Not ever, Foggy. Please.”

She’d hate him. He’s kept this secret from her his entire life, for their entire friendship. Matt’s barely holding on as it is, but if he didn’t have her–

* * *

Matt grabs his briefcase and heads for the door. Spins back around because he forgot his jacket. His head is full of Karen and the way she’d kissed his cheek that morning in greeting. 

It’s a relatively new thing she’s started doing, dropping kisses on his face in greeting, on his head when she refills his coffee. It feels like a natural extension of their friendship, and he can’t read too much into it. It’s torture; the very best way to slowly go insane. 

She hugs Foggy, though, and that stinging jealousy keeps him from losing it altogether. 

She hugs Matt too sometimes, but not as often as she used to, in high school. When he thinks back on it, Matt’s not sure when that changed. These days she hugs Foggy hello, goodbye, good job, it’s Tuesday. It feels like getting the short end of the stick, like being cheated. The kisses are great, but he wants her body against him, wants to hold her in his arms where she belongs. He wants it all.

Matt heads out into the office, feeling a little bit like a ghost. A candle burning at both ends. A vigilante short on sleep and emotional support. He won’t last long.

“I love you, Karen.”

She stands up and moves around her desk to touch his arms.

“Are you okay? What’s wrong?”

He laughs, too high and a little manic. 

“Nothing. I just had to say it.”

“Oh. Okay.” He dips to press a kiss to her cheek, this time. She’s soft, vanilla and jasmine, and his whole body aches for her.

Outside the office door, he stops to listen. He hears her sit back in her desk chair, but then it’s quiet. No shuffling of papers, no tapping on the keyboard. Just silence.

* * *

She texts him at 3:30 the next morning.

 **K:**  I love you too

 **K:** A lot

His judgement isn’t to be trusted this late at night, so he doesn’t respond.

* * *

Karen goes out on dates sometimes, but doesn’t usually see any of them a second time.

“Sorry boys, I have prior engagements,” she says when Foggy suggests dinner.

“With who?” Karen doesn’t look up, but the sharpness in Matt’s tone makes Foggy whip around.

Karen shrugs, “A guy from Starbucks.”

A guy. Just some _random_ guy. Matt’s so jealous he can hardly breathe.

When they part ways, Foggy turns to him, sympathetic and supportive.

“Dude–”

“Don’t.”

* * *

“It’s literally the worst time to do this,” Karen bemoans, huddled in her jacket, mittens, scarves and earmuffs. She’s moved her things into the conference room, because they’re replacing the window in the main office.

“Heating savings will make up for a day of discomfort,” Matt insists. 

“I can’t feel my face.”

“Have some coffee.”

“Ugh, my boss is the worst. I need to file a complaint with HR. Oh wait, I am HR.”

There are two men doing the work, the older gentleman Matt had spoken to, and his nephew, who pokes his head into the conference room to talk to Karen every few minutes. He’s tall and sturdy, but Matt could definitely take him.

“Can I buy you dinner tonight? Make up for the chilly day?” he asks, when the work is done and they’ve cleaned up their tools.

“Oh, thank you,” she’s sincere and apologetic, “but I’m with someone.”

Matt and Karen walk out together a few hours later. He shoots for casual, but he’s probably too strung out to hit the mark.

“I didn’t know you were seeing somebody. Anyone we know?”

“Oh,” she says, surprised. “No, it’s– I’m not really.”

Matt’s relief is instant and overwhelming. He feels like an asshole for being thankful she’s alone. A good friend would want her to find someone, to be happy. He just wants that someone to be him.

“You could’ve just told him you weren’t interested.”

“It wasn’t  _totally_  a lie. I kind of am with someone,” she huffs a nervous laugh and nudges him with her elbow. Matt has so many things to say, all of them too honest, so he doesn’t say anything at all.

That **_maybe_** is there, hanging around like a third wheel, and it’s getting harder to ignore.


End file.
